


Meeting You Again For The First Time

by leslie_crusher



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Chance Meetings, Getting Together, Holidays, M/M, Post-Canon, Steter Secret Santa 2020, Tooth-Rotting Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-21
Updated: 2020-12-21
Packaged: 2021-03-10 18:47:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,837
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28221888
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/leslie_crusher/pseuds/leslie_crusher
Summary: 10 years down the road, Stiles has moved on from Beacon Hills and all her monsters and built a new life in the mountains of New Jersey, thinking it’s about as far away from his past as he can get. Then he runs into Peter and everything gets a little more complicated and a whole lot better.
Relationships: Peter Hale/Stiles Stilinski
Comments: 27
Kudos: 391





	Meeting You Again For The First Time

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Goddess47](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Goddess47/gifts).



> This is my 2020 secret Santa gift to [goddess47](Http://goddess47.tumblr.com) I hope you enjoy!
> 
> Somehow the bulk of this actually ended up taking place at Thanksgiving instead of Christmas but what can you do? 
> 
> It takes place in the future and has very few allusions to specific canon events but the following things definitely do not exist 1. Cora 2. Malia 3. COVID
> 
> I wrote a draft with Cora existing but it just wasn’t working for the tone I was going for and the whole “I lost my virginity to your daughter” thing skeeves me out so she had to go too. RIP.
> 
> This basically takes place in my hometown because I hate pretending to know things about places I’ve never been lol. 
> 
> Betaed by [my friend Lex](Http://schleprocked.tumblr.com)

Stiles had moved to a small town in New Jersey and taken a job as a cop for the express purpose of getting away from Beacon Hills and all its monsters. Imagine his surprise when he pulled some asshole over for doing 70mph on the curvy mountain roads and said asshole was none other than Peter Hale. 

His first thought was that Peter had not been lying about werewolves aging slower than humans, he didn’t look much older than the last time Stiles had seen him, over ten years ago. His second thought was to accuse Peter of stalking him but Peter provided proof that he’d been living there for over two years at this point. Well before Stiles had even heard of the town. They parted that day with a warning about the speeding and a “please don’t kill anyone” which made Peter laugh but eventually Stiles secured the promise. 

They didn’t see each other again for a few weeks until a body turned up in the woods. Could have been your standard bear attack but Stiles had seen too much in his time to rule out the possibility that it was something else. So, reluctantly, he called Peter, the only person he knew within 500 miles that could help him with this particular problem. It turned out that the hiker had actually just been stupid enough to get between a mama bear and her cubs but Peter was glad Stiles had called him. Said it showed that his good sense hadn’t dulled in the years since they’d last met. 

There wasn’t a ton of actual, non-drug crime in the small mountain town but every few weeks, something would go down and Stiles would call Peter to check for links to the supernatural. Usually it wasn’t, there was one passing omega that Peter ran out of town and a kidnapping that may have been the start of a sacrifice if they hadn’t managed to track the guy down before he got to the killing part. 

Sometimes afterward, if there wasn’t a ton of paperwork or clean up to do, they would grab a beer or hang out at Peter's swanky little cabin and watch movies. It was weird. Stiles wasn’t sure if “friends'' was the right word to describe whatever they were to each other but it didn’t feel like the wrong word either. It was getting a lot harder to remember the monster that turned his whole life upside down when faced with just Peter, this regular, charmingly sarcastic guy who was super neurotic about his DVD collection (organized by genre and then alphabetized) and kept Stiles’ favorite drinks in his fridge even though he described them as “fruit-flavored battery acid”. 

Peter didn’t actually have a pack. He maintained enough of a relationship with Derek to stop himself from going entirely rogue and he eventually admitted that having Stiles as a reminder of home and pack helped. So Stiles wrote their friendship off as some sort of mutually beneficial business relationship, Stiles kept Peter sane, Peter helped Stiles with work, everyone was as close to happy as two traumatized survivors of the hellmouth could possibly be. 

But sometimes Stiles got lonely in a different way and needed another kind of company. He had long since come to terms with the dual facts that he was bisexual and that no woman could ever live up to the fantasy of Lydia Martin that he has built up in his head all those years ago, so when cruising for hookups he tended to lean towards men. 

There was a gay bar a few towns over, that was a bar downstairs and a club upstairs. He tended to avoid the club level because seeing him dance was a sure-fire way to make sure he didn’t get laid. It was one such night when Peter found him there. Stiles watched him walk in and head for the stairs up to the club section. He could see the exact moment Peter caught his scent. He stopped for a second to focus his senses and then his head turned and they were making direct eye contact. 

Peter sauntered over in that infuriating way he does before slotting himself into place behind Stiles at the bar, with an arm on either side of him. 

“And what exactly brings you here, Stiles?” It takes some effort but Stiles manages to suppress a shiver at hearing that voice whispering in his ear. 

“Same as you, Peter,” he answers, “trying to get laid. So unless you’re offering-“ 

“And if I am?” 

Stiles swallowed past a lump in his throat. This was definitely not how he saw this evening going down but there was a part of him that desperately wanted to see what was going to happen. “Are you?”

“I don’t see why not. We both know the other isn’t currently a serial killer, I have a fantastically comfortable bed, and I know you’ve always been attracted to me.” He said that last part while pressing his nose to the pulse point on Stiles’ neck. 

“Come on, dude. Using chemosignals against me is a clear violation of the bro code.”

“And what about fucking you? What does the code say about that?” Voice barely a whisper, he pressed in closer against Stiles’ back, still careful not to be caging him in but making his intent clear. “Say ‘no’, right now and I’ll go upstairs and find some twink to take home, and you’ll find someone down here to scratch your itch and nothing will change between us. Or say ‘yes’ and I’ll take you home and show you what you’ve been missing all these years sleeping with humans who can’t hear your racing heart or every hitch of your breath- yeah, just like that one- to know exactly what you like, what you need. What do you say, Stiles?”

Stiles spent all of ten seconds contemplating before swinging around on his stool and pulling Peter into a searing kiss. 

Later that night as he lay panting in Peter's bed, trying to work up the strength to stand and walk out, he was surprised to feel Peter cleaning him off and then pulling him into strong arms. He placed a few soft kisses against Stiles neck and shoulder and Stiles took a few seconds to marvel at how bizarre a situation he was in, the man who had once been the monster in his nightmares was gently holding him after what was objectively the best sex of his life. “Stop freaking out. Go to sleep,” was mumbled against the back of his neck and, yeah, that sounded like a really good idea. 

It was another surprise Stiles didn’t quite know how to feel about (and he really was racking those up these days) when Peter was still in bed with him in the morning. The older man was clearly awake and was softly tracing patterns on Stiles’ arms with the tips of his fingers, possibly playing connect the dots with his moles. He was thinking maybe everything would be alright when Peter told him to use his shower if he wanted, and where to find a spare toothbrush, and that he would go make breakfast for them both. 

Breakfast morphed into making out against the counter and Stiles was getting the impression that they had not actually had a one night stand as he had assumed. It felt an awful lot like Peter wanted him to stick around, now even more than during the tentative early days of their friendship. 

“Stop.”

“Stop what?”

“Thinking so loudly!”

“Okay, well, what are we doing?!”

“I feel like you really shouldn’t need that explained at this point!”

“You know what I mean!”

“Had I wanted a one night stand, I would have pretended not to see you. I saw an opportunity to take a step that we both wanted and I took it. I like you. When you’re done with work tonight I would like it very much if you would come back, preferably with some shawarma from that place we like, and then I’ll blow you while you watch that terrible space show on Netflix.” 

Stiles could do little more than blink in the face of this revelation. That...all sounded really nice. “Okay. Okay yeah. I can. I can do that.” 

“Good.” And Peter pulled him back in for another kiss. 

Oddly enough, the addition of sex to their relationship changed surprisingly little. Stiles got Peter officially hired as a consultant so they worked together pretty regularly and then spent their evenings arguing over whose taste in tv shows was worse (cheesy sitcoms and bad sci-fi vs westerns and police procedurals) only now instead of falling asleep on the couch after a long night of bullshitting, Peter would take him to bed. They didn’t even always have sex, sometimes they just slept together. It was the closest thing to a stable healthy relationship Stiles had ever had and it scared the living shit out of him if he thought about it too hard but, when he just let himself experience it, it was so nice and comforting. 

Months passed before he knew it and suddenly it was November and they had been together for just over six months. Stiles had made a copy of Peter’s house key and just started showing up whenever he felt like it. He had taken over a whole shelf in Peter’s bathroom and both a drawer in his dresser and a section of his (really huge) closet for his work uniforms. His DVDs had wormed their way onto Peter’s meticulously organized shelves and, as Peter told him regularly, his scent was so thoroughly embedded in the furniture that if they ever broke up he would have to move. It was nice. It was the kind of stability Stiles didn’t think he was ever going to have. He certainly hadn’t imagined he would have it with Peter Hale of all people. 

Which was sort of the only real problem they had going for them. Neither of them wanted to break the spell and actually tell their friends and family (well, okay, Stiles’ friends and mostly his family. Stiles’ friends and family and also Derek who was sort of Stiles’ friend but Peter’s only family so he got dibs on that one.) and it wasn’t really a problem problem, just a bridge that they knew they would have to cross one day that neither of them was particularly looking forward to. 

Unfortunately, the thing about bridges is that eventually you reach a river and you stop having any choices. 

Stiles decided not to go back home for Thanksgiving because he wouldn’t be able to get the whole week off and the trip to California is a long one. He figured he and Peter would just have a sort of regular night in and maybe watch the dog show if no one got murdered and they had to work. What he was not expecting was for his whole little world to come crashing down around him the Monday before Thanksgiving.

Peter was in the shower and Stiles was just getting ready for work when the doorbell rang. He didn’t hesitate to answer it because he was ready to leave anyway and it’s not like the entire town, including all of the cops at the station, wasn’t fully aware of their relationship. So, of course, when he opened the door he found Derek standing on the other side. The two stared at each other for a solid minute before either of them processed the situation enough to speak.

“....uh?” Or at least something similar to speaking, on Stiles’ part.

It was enough to spur Derek into speaking though, and he managed an entire sentence. “Stiles? What are you doing here?”

At this point, Stiles’ brain went in the full opposite direction and landed on his old stand-by: rambling until he either arrived at a point or ran out of thoughts. “Yeah! Hey Derek! Good to see you! How have you been? I have been well. I was just… you know what? This really feels like his problem. So I’m gonna let him deal with it. I’m gonna...go now. Tell him… Tell him that I fucking hate him for not warning me about this and I’ll be back whenever you stop being here. Okay bye!”

And with that, he ran off to his car and peeled out of the driveway so fast he could see the gravel cloud in his rearview mirror.

When Peter came downstairs he found his boyfriend missing and his nephew sitting on his couch. 

“Well. I’m sure that went well.” He said by way of greeting. 

“Stiles says to tell you he fucking hates you. Also, hey, since when the hell are you sleeping with Stiles???” 

“May-ish?” Peter didn’t bother lying, the whole place reeked of their combined scent and sex. It was one of Peter’s favorite things but it must have come as a surprise to Derek who hadn’t seen or heard from Stiles in years and certainly had no reason to believe that Peter had, not only seen him, but entered a relationship with him. 

“May?” Watching the complicated series of facial expressions flitting across his nephew’s face, Peter couldn’t help but think of the time that Stiles, having had a few too many drinks, had gone off on a huge rant about Derek’s ability to communicate solely through eyebrow movement in front of half the station at the 4th of July picnic. He schooled his face because he knew this was a serious conversation and he didn’t want to explain to Derek what he found so funny. “Why didn’t you say anything? We talk every week!”

“It wasn’t personal, Derek. We haven’t told anyone. The people in town know because Stiles is the least subtle person I’ve ever met and they’re all a bunch of tireless gossips.” It was true. There had never been a big relationship reveal, Stiles simply started bringing Peter with him to places besides crime scenes and he was always doing impulsive things like making Peter dance with him to the music coming out of restaurants they were walking past. Peter, powerless to deny the younger man’s whims, went along with it without complaint, which, honestly might have been a bigger clue than anything Stiles did. There was another reason they had kept their relationship somewhat more intentionally a secret to specifically the Beacon Hills crowd and he figured Derek deserved to know. “Besides I’m not exactly looking forward to having to explain myself and my relationship to Scott McCall.” 

“Why not? You don’t care what Scott thinks.” Peter’s answer was a somewhat complicated eyebrow movement of his own. “But Stiles does.” Peter nodded at the correct interpretation. “You’re afraid he’ll leave you if Scott tells him to.”

“I’m not afraid. I’m simply acknowledging the possibility and strategically avoiding the situation as long as possible.”

“You can’t put it off forever.”

“I know that.”

“He seemed pretty upset that I found out. It doesn’t take too big a stretch to think he doesn’t want Scott and company to find out either. So what are you going to do?”

“I’m going to go find him. Talk to him like the grown adults we sometimes are.”

Derek smiled to himself while Peter grabbed his things. “I’ll just...stay here then?”

Pausing briefly to flip off his nephew, Peter was out the door with only a quick “Do make yourself at home,” as a parting shot.

Finding Stiles wasn’t actually hard, he was an on-duty police officer in a small town, it was just a question of which speed trap he was parked at and it just took a quick call to Trish at the station to find that out. 

The stop wasn’t far from Peter’s place so he walked. The 30 minutes of exercise helping to clear his head and really think about the conversation he wanted to have. Admitting that Derek was right had never been a skill Peter had developed, before or after the fire, but in this case, he had to admit he had a point. They really couldn’t just live in this perfect bubble of just the two of them forever. Eventually, they’re gonna have to bring their lives before into the life they had now. He just hoped that the collision wouldn’t have too many casualties. 

Stiles saw him coming and unlocked the passenger side door to let him into the cruiser, a good sign that at least he wasn’t going to completely lock Peter out of his life. 

“Hey,” he said, much more hesitantly than he would have liked.

“Why didn’t you tell me Derek was coming?” Stiles answered, jumping straight to the point because had been agonizing over that question all morning. What did Peter have to gain by letting Stiles be surprised and caught off guard like that? Why wouldn’t he give him the choice to say ‘no, I’m not ready for your only living family member to know about us’?

“I genuinely forgot. We made these plans around the holiday season last year, I’ve been so distracted by,” he gestured to Stiles, the town around them, back to Stiles and himself, “everything that it completely slipped my mind. There’s no ulterior motive here.” 

Stiles could understand, probably better than most people, what that was like and he really didn’t think Peter was up to his old tricks again so, for the sake of his sanity, he was going to take that at face value and forgive the slip-up. But that didn’t mean he was actually ready to deal with the situation. “How long is he staying?”

“A week.”

“Okay. I think I’ll...make myself scarce for the week.”

“Why are you so upset about this? Do you think Derek is going to judge you?”

“No, I just. I- Seeing him today, it felt like getting slapped in the face by our past. Where we come from, how we actually met. It was like as long as I never had to face it, we could keep pretending that we met here, as adults, and fell for each other in the regular human way. If we let Beacon Hills and Derek and Scott into the life we’ve built here, then we have to acknowledge it. We have to really look at the things we did to each other and still somehow go about our day to day, normal couple activities? I wanted to pretend for a while longer.”

“We aren’t those people anymore, Stiles.”

“I know. And I swear this is not me breaking up with you. I’m just not ready to deal with Derek right now.”

“Okay, I won’t make you. Just don’t shut me out completely. I’ve grown quite attached to you.”

“I won’t. I don’t even think I could. Over the last six months I’ve put up several walls to protect myself from letting this actually become a serious relationship and you Miley Cyrused your way through all of them.”

“I’m not going to pretend I know what that means. I’ll let you get back to work now.” He reached into his pocket and pulled Stiles’ turkey wrap he had forgotten in the fridge when he left that morning, handing it over and pulling Stiles in for a quick kiss. “Have a nice Thanksgiving. I’ll see you whenever you’re ready.” 

Peter definitely went to bed alone the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, having spent the day with Derek prepping for dinner the next day. There may have only been two of them but they were werewolves and could easily put away an amount of food meant for a family of 7, plus Peter wanted to save some leftovers to bring to Stiles. 

It was, therefore, very surprising when he awoke in the middle of the night to the familiar weight of Stiles on his chest. It should have been surprising that he had managed to sneak in, not only to the house but into Peter’s bedroom without waking the sleeping wolf and Peter would bet anything that the noise had in fact roused Derek. It said a lot about the level of comfort in their relationship that he had allowed himself to sleep through it. He brought a hand up and ran his fingers through Stiles’ hair causing the man in question to turn his head and meet Peter’s eyes. 

“I thought you were staying away until Derek left.”

“I was going to but I guess I missed you or whatever.”

“It’s been less than two days. I was going to come over to your place tomorrow night.”

“Yeah, I know. But you’ve grown on me.”

“Like a weed?”

“Like ivy. Beautiful, but still an invasive species and ultimately I will collapse under your weight.”

“I will hold you up if you start collapsing.”

“I know you will.” After that statement, Stiles put his head back down and was quiet for so long that Peter figured he was ready to go to sleep. If it hadn’t been so quiet in the room, even with his werewolf hearing, he may have missed the quiet “I love you” that Stiles all but breathed out. 

It was the first time either of them had said it and it threw Peter for a bit of a loop. He knew that he was serious about Stiles, that he wanted them to be together for a good long while. He was fully ready to commit but something was holding him back from saying the actual words. Instead, he said something equally impulsive and not to be dismissed as far as romantic gestures go. 

“Move in with me.”

Stiles’ head shot back up and he met Peter’s eyes in the dim moonlight. 

“What?”

“Move in with me. Stop having that shitty little apartment that you never spend any time in and just move your seven remaining possessions over here.”

“I own more than seven things, douchebag. Just because I’m not Mr. Super Rich Guy who has everything he could ever want.” Stiles retorted with a flick to Peter’s pec.

“Yes, and about 80% of them have migrated over here in the past few months. Or did you think I didn’t notice you stashing your PlayStation next to my Xbox?”

“I wanted them to be friends.” Stiles pouted exaggeratedly but it quickly turned into a smile when Peter chuckled at his dumb joke. “You mean it?”

“Yes.”

“Okay then. My lease is up next month anyway so I was pretty much going to move in anyway and waiting for you to ask was just a formality.” He teased, which had the intended effect when Peter grabbed him around the waist and flipped them over with a growl. 

The next morning Peter came downstairs to find Derek in the kitchen with coffee already brewed. 

“Morning.” He mumbled as he poured a cup for himself. 

“Morning. Where’s Stiles?” Derek asked.

“Sleeping.” And Peter figured he was done putting off difficult conversations for the time being so, rather than waiting for Derek to bring it up, he asked “I take it you heard all of that last night.”

Derek nodded into his mug. “I mean, I put in headphones when it became clear you were about to start having sex, but I got most of the talking.” He paused, taking a second to decide if he really wanted to broach the topic that was really on his mind, but figured ‘fuck it. Everyone else is being emotionally honest today, might as well’ and continued, “Heard him tell you he loves you. Heard you not say it back.”

Peter sighed. Damn his nephew for being so good at reading him, even after all these years. “Don’t psychoanalyze me, Derek.”

“It’s a simple question. Do you love him?”

Realizing the topic was not going to be dropped, Peter did something he hadn’t done in a long time and told the whole truth. “Derek the Venn diagram of people I’ve said ‘I love you’ to and people who are still alive has exactly one point of intersection and I’m looking at him.”

“Stiles isn’t going to die because you love him. If anything that’s my schtick. You just got caught in the crossfire.” Derek responds with a shrug.

“Yes. Thank you for that, by the way.”

“Don’t change the subject. Do you love him?”

“Yes.” 

“Good. You’ll take care of each other.” He said with a smile, though Peter noticed just a second too late that Derek wasn’t actually looking at him, but at a point just over his shoulder. He turned and wasn’t surprised at all to see Stiles standing there with a big dopey grin on his face. Peter couldn’t help but answer with a soft smile of his own, the kind that really only Stiles had ever seen since before the fire, honestly it’s silly that Peter didn’t figure out he was in love with him sooner.

“Good morning!” Stiles swept into the kitchen, distracted Peter with a kiss, and then stole his coffee right out of his hands. Peter, having known that would happen, rolled his eyes and turned back to the coffee machine and went about filling the second mug he had already pulled out. Stiles took a sip of his stolen coffee and then put the mug down and turned to Derek. “Sorry I was weird. It really is so good to see you.” He pulled Derek into a strong hug.

Derek hugged back just as fiercely. “You’ve always been weird. It’s great to see you too. I might even have missed you.”

“Please your life has been so empty since I moved away. I bet no one even understands your eyebrow speak without me and Peter around.”

Peter left them to it and started heating a pan and pulling out the pancake mix. It was a Thanksgiving morning tradition in both the Hale and Stilinski homes. 

“Did you miss me enough to, say, help me move?” Stiles asked with a generous helping of puppy eyes. He wasn’t Scott McCall level but he could get the job done.

“What? You want to move in this week? He just asked you last night!”

“I know but half my shit is here already and I don’t want to give Uncle Fear Of Commitment a chance to change his mind.” 

Peter slapped Stiles on the ass with his spatula in response to that comment and then went back to his cooking. Stiles laughed to himself and then walked up behind Peter and wrapped his arms around him. “Say it.” He demanded with a kiss to Peter’s cheek.

“I love you. Brat.” 

Stiles beamed and stole another quick kiss before flitting off into the living room to put the parade on the TV. Derek shook his head, smiling, and followed after telling Peter again how good the two of them were for each other. Just as he was getting settled down onto Peter’s stupidly expensive sofa Stiles decided to ruin the moment. 

“You realize that this means we’re done with the whole illicit affair aspect of our relationship. I’m gonna have to tell the family back home. You’re gonna have to come to Christmas as my boyfriend and sit there and play nice with my dad, and Scott, and Melissa.”

“Fuck.” Peter said as he walked into the room with three plates with such skill that Stiles would think he had been a waiter at some point if it wasn’t for the fact that he had, you know, met him. “I’m sorry. It’s been fun but I would like to utilize a take-backsie.”

“Absolutely not. I’m texting my dad right now that we’ll be there Christmas Eve in time for presents.” Stiles pulled out the phone to do just that. Peter and Derek reacted almost simultaneously to the announcement but in very different ways.

“You open presents on Christmas Eve? Also, can I come? I really want to watch Peter squirm while trying not to be a dick to Scott.”

“You’re telling your father about our relationship in a text?”

Stiles was unphased. “Of course you can come, Derek. And opening the presents on Christmas Eve is an old Stilinski-McCall tradition because both of our parents always had to work on Christmas Day. And yes a text because if I call him he’s gonna want to talk to you (read: threaten you with horrible murder) and I don’t want to have to deal with that. This way he will spend so much time overthinking it that by tonight when we do our actual Thanksgiving phone call he’ll be much more open to me explaining that, now that you aren’t homicidal, you’re actually all soft and squishy and completely in love with me.”

“I most certainly am not!”

“Please! You’re essentially a marshmallow. A were-mallow if you will.”

“I will not.”

“I will. Do you think we can get that printed on an ugly sweater in time for Christmas?”

“Derek, don’t encourage him!”

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!
> 
> This is the first fic I’ve completed in a few years and I actually really like it so that’s cool.
> 
> Find me on [tumblr](Http://heysadsavior.tumblr.com) if you want to.


End file.
